Mateer's message before the opener: play clean, whoever's across
John Mateer wants a spotless opener even against a 41.5-point underdog, and Brent Venables is chasing the explosive offense that eluded Oklahoma last season.
Mateer's demand for himself: play clean, no matter who's on the other sideline
John Mateer isn't treating a 41.5-point mismatch as license to relax. "Play clean football. Play up to our standard," the fifth-year senior said this week, according to Sports Illustrated's Sooners coverage — tight end Hayden Hansen made the same point when he said Oklahoma can't afford to put "any weaknesses on film" in Week 1, whoever's lined up across from it. Oklahoma added to the room this week, too: Braxton Fely joined the roster after a Cleveland County court order cleared the former Boise State defensive lineman to play, one more body Venables can throw at UTEP.
Brent Venables wants more than clean, though — he wants explosive. "We need to be a more explosive offense," he said Monday, tying it to a run game that finished 104th nationally last season, and pointing to Colorado State transfer Lloyd Avant as part of the fix, calling him "incredibly consistent" and adding that "his play is really loud, how he competes is really loud." Mateer looks different too — he spent the offseason reworking his throwing motion, and Pete Nakos reported for On3 that people kept stopping him at the Manning Passing Academy just to tell him how much cleaner it looked. Fans see it for the first time Friday.
None of this is coming from a green group. Of the 70 players on Oklahoma's two-deep, 43 are in at least their third year of college football, per News on 6's Sooners coverage, and the Sooners open the season ranked No. 10 in the AP preseason poll. That's the experience Venables is leaning on to make "clean football" more than a slogan once the ball is actually kicked off.
Last season ended in the Playoff, on a night Alabama had the last word
Oklahoma closed out last season on a four-game run that included road wins over Tennessee (33-27) and Alabama (23-21) in November, then home wins over Missouri (17-6) and LSU (17-13) to punch a Playoff ticket. That set up a rematch with Alabama on December 20 in the Playoff, and this time the Crimson Tide got even, winning 34-24 to end Oklahoma's season.
That near-miss is still the backdrop for everything happening in Norman right now — the extension, the roster additions, the returning quarterback. A team that beat Alabama once last season and lost to them once in December isn't rebuilding, it's trying to close a gap it already found once, and that's the frame this opener sits under before a single 2026 snap is played.
Venables surprised 5 walk-ons with scholarships, and one just boomed a 68-yard kick
On his weekly radio show this week, Venables announced that defensive back Casen Calmus, receiver Trey Brown, offensive linemen Kenneth Wermy and Sean Hutton, and kicker Liam Evans had all been put on scholarship — the team, Venables said, "went absolutely bananas" when he made the call in front of everybody, according to Sports Illustrated's Sooners coverage. Calmus is the son of Rocky Calmus, the former OU Butkus Award winner, which is the kind of detail that makes a program feel like it eats its own.
Two of the five are more than a nice story now — they're on the actual depth chart for Friday. Hutton is the No. 3 left guard, and Evans is the backup kicker behind Lou Groza Award winner Tate Sandell after reportedly booming a 68-yard field goal in practice this preseason. It is exactly the kind of moment a fan base remembers long after the score of the opener fades.
UTEP walks into Norman carrying none of the pressure and all of the history
Kickoff is tonight vs. UTEP at Gaylord Family — Oklahoma Memorial Stadium, and the history here is lopsided: Oklahoma is 5-0 all time against the Miners, outscoring them 248-51, with the last meeting a 45-13 win back in 2022 that doubled as Brent Venables' head-coaching debut. UTEP arrives off a 2-10 season and into year 3 under Scotty Walden, the kind of program-building climb that makes a trip to Norman look less like a measuring stick and more like a paycheck game.
The number reflects that gap. The line opened at -41.5 for Oklahoma, with the total set at 50.5 — the middling read of a game almost nobody expects to be competitive but nobody's certain will turn into a track meet, either. UTEP's own beat coverage out of El Paso has framed the trip about as bluntly as it gets: nearly all of the outside pressure sits with the home team, and nothing is expected of the Miners walking in.